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                 * C h i n a   N e w s   D i g e s t *

                             (News General)

                       -- Feb. 28 (II), 1990


Table of Contents
                                                                     # of Lines
News Brief  ............................................................ 24
1. Deng Xiaoping Unhappy With Li Peng  ................................. 99
2. First Class Secretary of PRC Embassy at U. of Florida ............... 75
3. Police Tailing Foreign Journalists More Since Martial Law Lifted .... 81
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News Brief
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(i)
From: simone@nyspi.bitnet (J. Yang)
Source: French News Agency, Tokyo, 2/27/90

The  Japanese  government  had refused Zhang Zhenghai's political
asylum applica- tion, Japan's former Justice Minister said.

Zhang hijacked an CAAC airplane at the end of last year to Japan.
He  will  ei-  ther  being sent back to China or goes to court in
Tokyo,  and Tokyo Suprem Court expected to make a decision within
two months.

(ii)
From: simone@nyspi.bitnet. (J. Yang)
Source: World Journal, Paris, 2/27/90

After  the  campaign  of  sending  democracy information to China
thrught  fax  mach-  nes,  pro-democracy activists in abroad will
initiate  the  second  wave  -- 24 hr.  broadcasting toward China
from  'The  Boat  of  The Godness of Democracy', which will leave
Paris  for  South  China  Sea  in March and arrive there on April
25th, and then start broadcasting immediately.

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1. Deng Xiaoping Unhappy With Li Peng
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From: "Jian Ding" <IZZYQ00@OAC.UCLA.EDU>
BY: SCHWEISBERG, DAVID R.
Source: BEIJING (UPI)   February 26, 1990

  Chinese  leader  Deng  Xiaoping is deeply unhappy with the per-
formance of hard-line  Premier Li Peng, but has agreed with other
leaders  to  retain  him  through this year to preserve political
stability, informed Chinese sources say.

   Deng,  however,  plans  to  call a major Communist Party meet-
ing  in  1991 during which he hopes to engineer the removal of Li
and  the  true  retirement  of   the  conservative  party  elders
supporting the unpopular premier, the sources said.

    Rumors   of   a  power  struggle  and  a  possible shakeup in
the  Chinese  leadership's  upper  echelons have been circulating
for  weeks  in  advance  of  the   annual   session   of  China's
rubber-stamp  parliament,  the  National People's Congress, which
opens March 20.
    The   meeting   will be the first full Congress session since
last  year's pro-democracy   movement   and  the  crackdown  that
followed.   Government  personnel   changes  are  announced  each
year   during   the   session, which generally ratifies decisions
already made by party leaders.

    Interviewed   in   recent   days,   the   sources,  including
Chinese  with connections  to senior officials and a party member
with  access  to  internal  documents,  said  Li  would  stay on,
although  one or two vice premiers and about four government min-
isters may lose their posts.

    "Deng  is not satisified with Li Peng," one source said. "But
the party is stressing stability, and they don't want to make any
major changes."

    The  leaders  believe  that  dumping  the  premier,  who  was
publicly instrumental  in  last year's violent suppression of the
protests,  might  be  seen   as   a  partial  reversal  of  their
stance  that  the  crackdown was justified, the sources said.

    "The   old   leaders   realize  that  getting  rid of Li Peng
would  please  Western  nations, but fear it might start domestic
turmoil,"  a  party member explained. "It would be like admitting
they were wrong."
    As  for much of the past decade, the current divisions in the
leadership  pit   Deng  and  moderates supporting his free-market
economic  reforms  against elderly  hard-liners  who  favor  cen-
tral   planning  and  are  wary  of the "open-door" policy toward
the West.

    The  godfather  of the hard-line camp is Chen Yun, 85, one of
Li  Peng's  mentors   and  the  chairman  of  the party's Central
Advisory  Commission,  a powerful  club  of  conservative  elders
who   launched  a  broad political tightening after last spring's
unrest.
    Ironically,   Deng  persuaded  the  hard-liners to relinquish
most  of  their  official   posts  at  the  party's 1987 national
congress,  but was forced to turn  to  them for support last June
in  the  crackdown  on  the  protests.  They  have since strongly
reasserted their influence.

    The  Chinese  sources  said  Li,  backed  by Chen and another
prominent  hard-liner,  Vice  President Wang Zhen, are leading an
internal  movement  to  roll    back   many  of  Deng's  reforms,
despite   public   support   for  the Deng-inspired party line of
continuing the program.

    "Deng   wants   to   resume  the  reform and opening," said a
well-connected  party   member.  "The  others  have  been  giving
lip   service   to   reform, especially to foreigners, but inter-
nally they have been rolling it back."

    Inspired  by  the  conservatives,  the  leadership  has since
late  1988  employed   a  broad  retrenchment  program  that  has
cooled  the  overheated economy  and  reined  in  inflation.  But
the price has been an industrial slowdown and an alarming rise in
unemployment.

    Li, 62, a colorless and uninspiring leader, seems universally
disliked,  even  by  officials.  The  sources said Deng and other
leaders  are  unhappy  with  Li's   economic  work  and he is the
prime candidate to serve as a scapegoat should the economic down-
turn worsen.

    However,   the  sources  said  Deng  has indicated to associ-
ates  he  will  wait.   But   he  has plans to convene a national
party  congress  next  year,  a  year  earlier than the five-year
interval that has generally prevailed.

    At   that  meeting he hopes to retire the conservative elders
and  abolish the  Central Advisory Commission, which he sees as a
bastion of obstruction to his economic goals.

    The   plan  is tenuous and oddly depends on which of the eld-
erly leaders survives.  Deng's  health  has clearly weakened dur-
ing  the  past  year,  while  Chen  Yun  has been reportedly near
death for months. Several other leaders are also ailing.

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2. First Class Secretary of PRC Embassy at U. of Florida
-----------------------------------------------------------------
From: Xiantu Peng <peng@omicron.cs.fsu.edu>
Source: a Florida local newspaper
newsgroup: china-net@gauss.stanford.edu

      A  speech  at Florida State University turned into a heated
exchange  between  Chinese  students  and a representative of the
Chinese  government  Friday  (Feb.  23)  when  Wuwei Zhang, first
secretary  of the embassy of the PRC, suggested government troops
didn't  fire  on  pro-democracy demonstrators in Tiananmen Square
last summer.

      Amid  sneers  and snickering, Wuwei Zhang told an obviously
skeptical  audience  of approximately 100 people (30 of them were
Chinese students) they could not rely on foreign press reports of
the Tiananmen Square massacre.

      In  a  question-and-answer  session  following  his speech,
Wuwei  cited statements made to the government-run People's Daily
shortly  after the incident be De-Jian Ho, a popular Chinese folk
singer.  Ho told the paper that government troops left the square
without shooting anyone.

      "If  you  only rely on newspapers and other Western reports
then  you  get  a  dark picture," said Wuwei. "If you leran about
what people there you will get another picture."

      But  several Chinese members of the audience quickly yelled
out that the same De-Jian Ho recently told a different story to a
Canadian newspaper.

      "You're a liar," yelled both Chinese and American audiences
at Zhang. "What's the difference? You killed innocent people."

      Before  and  during  Zhang's  speech,  members  of  the FSU
Chinese  Students and Scholars Association staged a slide show in
halfway  of  the  auditorium  depicting the dead bodies resulting
from  the Chinese goverment's crackdown on mainly-student protes-
ters.

      The  group  also  mounted  posters  in  the halfway reading
"Never  forget the deaths for democracy," "We have a dream, free-
dom  and democracy in China" and "What happened in Eastern Europe
can happen in China."

      The representative of CSSA told the reporter that his group
had no intension of disturbing the speech.

      "Everybody  has  the right to free speech in this country,"
he said. "But nobody has the right to tell lies."

      Wuwei  Zhang,  the keynote speaker of the FSU World Affairs
Program's  simulated  UN conference, was heavily guarded by secu-
rity  from  FSU police and the Florida Department of Law Enforce-
ment.

      During the Question-and-answer session, Wuwei justified the
government's  Tiananmen  crackdown by saying China can't continue
on its path toward economic reform if peace is disrupted.

      The  representative  of  Chinese  student  said he expected
Wuwei  Zhang, a career politician, to argue only the government's
side of the Tiananmen issue.

      "That's  their  purpose,"  he said. "The Chinese government
and  the  Chinese  Communist  Party is interested only in staying
power.  That'  their highest priority. They don't care much about
people's lives."

      The  question-and-answer  session  was shortened because of
the angers of the Chinese students.  Wuwei Zhang left the audito-
rium  by  taking  police car.  The sponsor refused to release the
place for Zhang to stay to Chinese students.

Zhemin

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3. Police Tailing Foreign Journalists More Since Martial Law Lifted
-------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Fangzhen Lin <lin@Neon.Stanford.EDU>
Source: AP news 27 Feb 90
By KATHY WILHELM
Associated Press Writer

    BEIJING  (AP)  -  Foreign journalists say plainclothes police
have been tailing them more often - even while they jog or shop -
in  the  month  since  the  government  lifted martial law in the
Chinese capital.

    Reporters  said  Monday  that as a result they have been more
cautious  about  talking  to  Chinese, not wanting to get them in
trouble with authorities.

    ''Several  (Chinese)  contacts  have  been  hauled before the
leaders  in their (work) units and told, 'We know you had contact
with  a  foreign journalist and this must stop,''' said a British
reporter.

    Like  the other journalists, he spoke on condition of anonym-
ity  for  fear  of  provoking  official  retaliation  against his
Chinese friends.

    Correspondents   from  nearly  a  dozen  news  organizations,
including  those from the United States, Soviet Union and Europe,
said  they  have been tailed at least once by plainclothes police
in recent weeks.

    Since  June, when the government crushed student-led protests
for  democracy,  official  access has been more limited, and even
many  ordinary  factories and offices are afraid to let reporters
visit for interviews.

    Under  martial  law  imposed  in Beijing during the protests,
foreign  reporters were required to get military approval for all
interviews.   The  requirement lapsed with the Jan. 11 lifting of
martial law, but the police surveillance appeared to be a substi-
tute measure.

    The British reporter said he had been tailed each of the past
three days, and that on one occasion plainclothes police tried to
photograph him meeting a Chinese friend in a park.

    The  next  day, police followed him to a hotel where he met a
Chinese  acquaintance,  and  three motorcycles and a van followed
his  car  from  the  hotel,  keeping pace when he accelerated and
drove  in  circles.  After he dropped off the Chinese man, police
pursued the man on foot, the reporter said.

    An  American  reporter  who noticed she was being tailed by a
man  on  a  bicycle  said it made her decide not to visit Chinese
friends, ''so I guess it's working.''

    She  and  several  other  reporters believe the surveillance,
which  in  many cases has been obvious, is intended to discourage
them from normal contacts with Chinese friends or news sources.

    ''What  we're  all  terribly  concerned  about  is  getting a
Chinese  in trouble,'' said another American reporter who said he
and his wife were followed even when they went jogging.

    In  the  past,  Chinese  have  been  accused  of giving state
secrets  to  foreigners with whom they were friendly, and in some
instances have been jailed.

    Others  have  been  denied  promotions or the chance to study
abroad because of friendship with a foreigner.

    Without  Chinese  friends, foreigners find themselves cut off
entirely  from Chinese society, isolated in their separate apart-
ment compounds and with little access to officials.

    China does not censor the writings of foreign reporters. How-
ever, it censors foreign news entering the country.

    Authorities  tear  out  articles  they consider objectionable
before allowing newspapers and magazines to go on sale in hotels.
Chinese-language  broadcasts  of  the U.S.-run radio station, the
Voice of America, have been jammed since June.

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|  China News Digest Subscription: (Xinmeng Liao) xliao@ccm.umanitoba.ca  |
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|  China News Digest Executive Editor: (Bo Chi)   chi@vlsi.uwaterloo.edu  |
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Wed Feb 28 12:23:08 EST 1990